UMich sued for alleged racial discrimination in its legal journal

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(The Center Square) – A legal group sued the University of Michigan and the school’s Michigan Law Review Association over alleged racial discrimination in its practices.

According to the lawsuit filed by nonprofit legal group America First Legal, the University of Michigan’s Michigan Law Review Association uses “race and sex preferences to select its members and articles.”

The Michigan Law Review Association is a student-run legal journal that contains, “articles by legal scholars and practitioners,” and “notes by law students,” according to its website.

In a news release on its lawsuit, America First Legal (AFL) wrote of Michigan Law Review’s adoption of “a radical diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) agenda, using a so-called ‘holistic review’ process to award illegal racial preferences to minorities over white and Asian applicants with superior academic credentials.”

AFL’s lawsuit “charges that the University’s practices discriminate against white and Asian applicants and scholars, denying them equal opportunities in membership selections, article publications, and citations,” the release said.

“AFL seeks to enjoin these illegal policies and compel the institution to adopt colorblind standards, holding the University accountable for its systemic racial bias,” the release said.

AFL said in its lawsuit that the practice of making race or sex based selections “violates the clear and unequivocal language of Title VI and Title IX.”

Additionally, AFL stated that “federal law prohibits universities that accept federal funds from discriminating on account of race or sex.”

AFL’s release explained that the taxpayer-funded University of Michigan “brazenly defies Title VI, the Equal Protection Clause, and 42 U.S.C. § 1981, employing secretive selection committees to enforce diversity quotas and discriminatory citation policies that favor ‘underrepresented’ authors while penalizing white scholars, including underrepresented Republicans and Protestant Christians.”

The lawsuit is in partnership with lawyers Jonathan Mitchell and Benjamin Flowers, according to AFL.

Mitchell told The Center Square that “the law reviews have a choice: They can get rid of their illegal race and sex preferences, or they can be sued.”

University of Michigan director of public affairs Kay Jarvis provided The Center Square with the school’s statement: “the University remains steadfast in its commitment to following the law. We will vigorously defend against these allegations.”

AFL’s lawsuit against the University of Michigan is on behalf of the Faculty, Alumni, and Students Opposed to Racial Preferences (FASORP), as stated in AFL’s news release.

FASORP is “a voluntary membership organization that litigates against race and sex preferences in academia” and is made up of faculty, alumni and students of various universities, as stated on its website.

In AFL’s news release, the organization’s president, Gene Hamilton, said, “no American should ever face discrimination based on their race.”

“Yet, despite clear law on point prohibiting such discrimination and numerous Supreme Court decisions, racial discrimination continues to be pervasive throughout academia,” Hamilton said.

“AFL will not tolerate this unconstitutional discrimination at the University of Michigan and is taking decisive action to restore meritocracy and protect American values,” Hamilton said.